Started during the 14th century or earlier as places for the teaching of common law, the Inns of Court include Gray's Inn, Lincoln's Inn, Inner Temple and Middle Temple. Students were educated until they became qualified apprentices (barristers) and were then allowed to practice law. After successful apprenticeship one might be conferred with the degree Serjeant-at-Law and no longer be an apprentice. In Tudor times sons of the gentry and nobility studied at the Inns of Court without intending to become lawyers.
